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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Zubkavich" data-source="post: 492948" data-attributes="member: 8810">Session Four: Eyes Like FireObviously taken aback by Setakawa’s arrival, Karen tries to maintain her cool while he explains what has brought him to her. He is a Japanese man who has taken on the honorable duty of guarding his ancestors' spirits. The eldritch power that the ancestors wielded in the past still exists and he keeps it safe and in check. He has traveled to New York to seek the source of a great imbalance that the spirits have felt. When he saw the hooded man, he could sense that it was connected to the imbalance and he lashed out at it with the might of his ancestors' magic. Knowing that very few people can see his power at work, he realized that Karen was not just an average girl.Setakawa tells Karen that he needs her help. The forces that he’s up against are invisible to normal people. Anyone who can see what he sees is a valuable asset. Karen is intrigued, but quite worried as well. She can’t just ditch her mob escort and running off to find whatever evil this man’s talking about doesn’t sound like a very safe option. She promises to contact him in the next day or two. He agrees and quickly leaves.After the wake winds down, Karen talks with Conroy about the gang information he’s been trying to find. Conroy can’t understand why his street contacts haven’t been able to dig anything up on Karen’s stitch-faced attacker. The only news he's come across is word of a large shipment of the drug called Viperous being brought in to Manhattan some time in the next two nights. The dealer involved is an urban legend of the streets called “Nicholas Click”. According to what Conroy’s heard, Nicholas is a mystery man, with no photographs of him ever being found. He communicates by cel phone via a series of clicking and popping noises; a complex code so that police and FBI can’t tell what’s being communicated to his flunkies.When Karen mentions Onan Aalak’s name to Claudio, he tells her that Onan is a young financial planner who helps him out with some of his investments. She asks him if she can meet with Onan, and Claudio arranges a lunch for the two of them to discuss her financial future. Karen makes sure that Claudio will be busy with other things so she can ask Onan about Regina and the supernatural. Feeling tired after another busy day, Karen crashes out in one of the guest rooms at Claudio’s estate.Heading downtown for lunch the next day, she finally meets Onan. Although his Eskimo ancestry is apparent, he’s obviously a well off modern man, complete with suit and tie. Karen struggles to break the ice in talking about the bizarre things that have happened to her, not wanting to come as some sort of wacko. She tries to explain how she met Regina and was instructed to meet with him. He seems intrigued, if also a bit confused. When he drops hints about spirits and other things, Karen takes a risk and tells him everything she’s seen; the stitched-faced man, the nebulous birds, the letters and the strange book. Onan’s obviously blown away by all the information and struggles to make sense of it all. He decides to come clean with her; although he's a financial planner and businessman, he still carries on shaman traditions from his family, performing rituals and communicating with totems of the spirit realm. He’s felt a horrible sense of dread over the last few weeks and the worst tides of it seem to coincide with the events that have happened to Karen over the last couple of days. Speaking in hushed tones, he tells her that some kind of new force seems set to do battle with the traditional spirits. He has no idea what it is, but is afraid of the war that may be coming.At that moment, Setakawa barges into the restaurant. His hands are bloody and he seems quite frantic. Trying to calm him down and keep the rest of the restaurant from becoming alarmed, Karen coaxes him for an explanation and tells him that Onan is as attuned to the situation as any of them. Setakawa tells her that one of his birds has found a source of great evil outside of New York. It’s heading towards the city and should be there some time that night. He needs her to come with him to investigate it. Karen asks Onan to come along as well. The young businessman doesn't know how to reply and is obviously quite afraid; he’s used to dealing with benign spirits, not physical evils. Karen needs a way to lose her mob escort, and feels that Onan may provide that “out”, along with adding support to their mission. When he asks her what kind of "out" she means, she smirks and says:“We’ll just convince my bodyguard that over our lunch here I’ve become quite smitten with you and that we’ve got a hot dinner date set for tonight.”Onan’s embarrassed beyond belief, but is unable to worm his way out of the situation. With the plan set, they agree to meet with Setakawa that night and scout out what is arriving in New York.When Conroy takes Karen home, she pretends to swoon over her meeting with Onan and plays up her lust for him. Conroy’s equal parts disgusted and worried. He has no intention of leaving her unprotected and she doesn’t want an escort to ruin her “private time” with her dinner date. After arguing back and forth about it, Conroy grudgingly agrees to give her a bit of time alone. She’s got two hours with Onan for dinner, and not a minute more before Conroy comes to pick her up. Dropping her off, he parks his car and waits in the driveway. With the clock ticking, she runs inside, gathers Onan and Setakawa and they head off out the back door to find Setakawa’s bird and the source of the spiritual distress.Setakawa’s innate connection to his bird leads them to an empty parking garage in the eastern end of Manhattan. Sneaking around the cement supports in the dark, they come across a strange gathering. Several men armed with machineguns are guarding a van full of boxes. As they watch, a shiny Porsche arrives driven by a man unlike anything they’ve ever seen.Standing about 6 feet tall, the man has gray skin and flickering reddish hair. He speaks with a hissing, almost steam-like hush to his voice, and slight puffs of smoke roll off his tongue as he punctuates his sentences. The clicks of sparks and fire seem to fill any silence in his speech. His eyes dart back and forth, hot and piercing. The other men seem quite afraid of him, giving him wide berth as he berates them for their lack of focus and slow delivery. As the men load the boxes into the Porsche, the fiery man brags:“If Lord Hizerath want an army, I’ll make sure he gets one. Every vagrant on the streets will serve our cause once more arrives from the portals, make no mistake about that. Nealcatus will take care of everything.”With that, Nicholas Click drives off into the night, leaving the parking garage in tense silence. After Karen picks the lock to the staff entrance, the trio sneak out of the parking garage and head out onto the street. Just as they’re about to head back to Onan’s and meet up with Conroy, Karen notices something very, very wrong. Conroy’s car is sitting across the street from the parking garage. Even worse, he’s not in it...</blockquote>

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